"A' canna deny it."
"Was he intoxicated?"
The crudeness of this question took away Drumtochty's breath, and suggested that something must have been left out in the creation of that advocate. Our men were not bigoted abstainers, but I never heard any word so coarse and elementary as intoxicated used in Drumtochty. Conversation touched this kind of circumstance with delicacy and caution, for we keenly realised the limitations of human knowledge.
"He hed his mornin'," served all ordinary purposes, and in cases of emergency, such as Muirtown market:
"Ye cud see he hed been tastin'."
When an advocate forgot himself so far as to say intoxicated, a
Drumtochty man might be excused for being upset.
"Losh, man," when he had recovered, "hoo cud ony richt-thinkin' man sweer tae sic an awfu' word? Na, na, a' daurna use that kin' o' langidge; it's no cannie."
The advocate tried again, a humbler, wiser man.
"Was there a smell of drink on him?"
"Noo, since ye press me, a'll juist tell ye the hale truth; it wes doonricht stupid o' me, but, as sure as a'm livin', a' clean forgot tae try him."